Hayes’ Bias will move mountains

Tori Bias

Story and photo by

LIZ ROBERTSON

Delaware Hayes High School senior Tori Bias will be tak­ing the less trav­eled road for young women. She has decided to go into engi­neer­ing, a field that’s cer­tainly not dom­i­nated by women.

Even back in sev­enth and eighth grades, Tori was build­ing bridges at sci­ence fairs. A recent women’s engi­neer­ing con­fer­ence at Ohio State Uni­ver­sity rein­forced her deci­sion to go into the tra­di­tion­ally male-dominated field.

The con­fer­ence allowed her to meet other women in the field and learn about dif­fer­ent areas within engi­neer­ing. Tori is con­sid­er­ing either civil (actu­ally build­ing things — from sky­scrap­ers to cul­verts) or indus­trial sys­tems (more the busi­ness side and com­pil­ing dif­fer­ent parts to make things more effi­cient, for exam­ple pro­duc­tion lines in fac­to­ries, she explained).

And Tori will reach her goal, accord­ing to Dempsey Mid­dle School Eng­lish teacher Heather Lowry.

“Tori is extremely focused and ded­i­cated to her aca­d­e­mics, ath­let­ics, fam­ily and com­mu­nity,” Lowry said. “Tori is an out­stand­ing men­tor and role model to the youth of our com­mu­nity, as well as her peers. Her strong sense of self, that her par­ents have fos­tered over the years, truly enables Tori to have total con­fi­dence when she makes a deci­sion. She does noth­ing half hearted.

“Tori has been hon­ored for her grades and con­tri­bu­tions to her com­mu­nity by being tapped last year by The National Hon­ors Soci­ety. On the ath­letic field, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen an ath­lete with such a strong work ethic, drive, and desire for her team, and for the win. Tori both on the ath­letic field, and as a mem­ber of our com­mu­nity, is an excep­tional leader. She is a self dri­ven young lady who will change our world for the bet­ter. Tori doesn’t set­tle in life; she’s a mover of moun­tains and mender of bridges.”

Tori’s other pas­sion beyond engi­neer­ing is soc­cer. Play­ing since age 4 when she began with the Delaware DYAA, she not only plays with the school team where she is cap­tain, but also for a club team out of Hilliard.

Trav­el­ing all over the sur­round­ing states play­ing with this team, she will go with them to Florida to play in the Dis­ney Show­case tour­na­ment at Christmas.

“I’ve devel­oped a crazy amount of con­nec­tions through play­ing soc­cer,” she said.

And with the inter­est in both areas, Tori has a big deci­sion ahead of her — where to go to college.

She has applied to both Otter­bein and Ohio Wes­leyan where she would play soc­cer, and Ohio State University’s engi­neer­ing pro­gram as well. Otter­bein has a five year pro­gram, three years at Otter­bein in physics, then two years at Case West­ern in engi­neer­ing. So there are many options for Tori to consider.

“That’s the thing at OSU. There would be no sports unless it is intra­mural. That’s the big deci­sion I’ll have to make,” she said.

Wher­ever she goes, she hopes to par­tic­i­pate in the co-op pro­gram each school offers.

And where does she see her­self end­ing up?

“I like big cities a lot, but I’m very com­fort­able with the sub­urb feel­ing,” Tori said, not­ing she could remain in this area. “But I always see myself going to Chicago or New York (City) for something.

Kevin West, social stud­ies teacher at the high school, taught Tori advanced place­ment U.S. his­tory her sopho­more year.

“AP classes dur­ing 10th grade are not typ­i­cal, which shows that Tori really chal­lenges her­self aca­d­e­m­i­cally. Addi­tion­ally, nobody worked harder dur­ing AP US His­tory than Tori that year: attend­ing review ses­sions, uti­liz­ing online resources, seek­ing addi­tional feed­back on tests and essays and ask­ing ques­tions in class. Her pos­i­tive, wel­com­ing atti­tude com­bined with that work ethic made Tori everyone’s ideal group project mem­ber,” he said.

Social stud­ies teacher Jor­dan Black­burn said, “Tori Bias is one of the best peo­ple who attends Hayes. She is an excep­tional student-athlete who puts oth­ers ahead of her­self and who has the matu­rity to act and think like an adult. She ‘gets it.’ Tori is a pro­found thinker who stim­u­lates class dis­cus­sions, but she also is an atten­tive lis­tener who oth­ers seek out when they are con­fronting prob­lems. I want kids in Delaware to look at her as a role model and say I could be like Tori some­day, because if they pur­sue that goal it will ben­e­fit our com­mu­nity in a very pos­i­tive manner.”

Tori has been busy at Hayes the past four years beyond soc­cer. She has been in choir each year, from con­cert to women’s chorale to symphonic.

“You’re sur­rounded by kids just like you. We’re all busy, all in numer­ous activ­i­ties,” Tori said. She cred­its choir teacher Dara Gillis who taught them to respect oth­ers as well as them­selves, and how to be effi­cient with their time.

She is also busy vol­un­teer­ing with National Honor Soci­ety and recently worked on the school’s home­com­ing committee.

In addi­tion to all her school activ­i­ties, Tori also babysits and works as a host­ess at Bun’s. She said the expe­ri­ence there makes her more accli­mated to Delaware peo­ple, “the reg­u­lars that come in. I like inter­act­ing with peo­ple. Peo­ple I never knew before in Delaware.”

With the fall being the busy, excit­ing time it is for any senior, Tori said, that when win­ter and spring hits, she hopes to have time to reflect.

“I’m def­i­nitely excited to meet new peo­ple,” she said on going to col­lege, adding it will be nice to live on her own and make her own deci­sions. “I’m not say­ing I’m not ner­vous, I’m so nervous.

“I’m leav­ing my com­fort zone. I real­ize there is not time to do things again. It’s def­i­nitely going to be sad to leave the peo­ple I grew up with,” she said. But she is look­ing for­ward to the future, which will include catch­ing up with her life­long friends when every­one comes home on breaks.

Tori is the daugh­ter of Dodie and Phillip Bias of Delaware.

Posted by Liz Robertson on Nov 18 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.